Nearly 200 million internet users have software installed that blocks advertisements. The popularity of adblockers is rapidly growing, according to a report from Adobe and Pagefair, a company that helps websites to gather data on adblocking and to counter them.
The worldwide amount of adblock users has increased with 41% in a years time. In the United States about 45 million users block ads, in Europe about 77 million users have ad blocking software installed. Globally, 198 million users block ads, in 2010 this was about 10 times less. In that year 21 million users were using adblocking software.
The estimated loss of revenue due to the blocked advertisements is about $20 billion for website publishers, according to the report.
The American state with the highest rate of users using adblock software is Oregon with 16.4%, while in Washington DC the lowest number of users with ad blockers are located, only 8.2% use them. Greece is the number one country when it comes to adblocking, about 37.5% of the users blocks ads, while in Slovakia only 8.9% users block ads.
The number one reason to install adblockers is the fear of personal information being misused. For millennials the increase in the number of ads is an important reason to block them. The majority of adblock users is male and tech savvy.
